the director of women inc and we are a agency in the mission and thank you so much for your leadership on this issue. as you will see, in the family

violence council. family violence is the number one reported crime in san francisco unfortunately and we will echo our hope for a workplace policy on domestic violence and we spoke about the positive impact that that could have not only for the survivors of domestic violence but for the co-workers and supervisor and everyone in the surrounding area at the workplace. something that i think is important to add, is that many of our clients come to us you know, they have been in these relationships that are abusive for some time. and many times we are one of the last calls out that they make. and they lean on the support of family, friends and in a lot of cases, people that are in their workplace for some support, some options. and someone to lean on,

unfortunately is what we have heard is that many times the response is that they were greeted with were not productive or posive. and i think that it is important to add that we believe that people have the best of intentions, they want to help people get out of abusive relationships or at least support them with some options. but they, if we don't give the community the tools to do so, workplaces, the tools to do so, and we can't really expect that great of an impact. and it can't all be done by community-based organizations. it is a huge. and we thank you for your support and leadership on this issue. if there are know other members who would like to comment. we can close the comment. >> supervisor olague? >> i just wanted to say that

today i would like to sign my name on as a response of this important resolution and i co-response ored once before and it was met with opposition from the domestic violence which i find ironic. but, that being said, to set the record straight because the woman for accountability pack dropped 100,000 of dirty money to launch a spear campaign against me to per spet you ate misinformation it does not make it true, that money would be better spent going to domestic violence programs and shelters, what i and everyone else have learned from this experience is that there are certain faction in our political movement who will go to any length including exploiting an issue as important as domestic violence, i will not let this stop me from doing what i know and passionately believe is the right thing to do.

in this case the right thing to do is sign my name as a sponsor and supporter and i won't be bullying into veering from my strong beliefs. >> as a woman from the working class, i will always and support the domestic survivors, my hope is that at the very least that my being scapegoated has led to a more exposure and something good will come out of it and i recognize the bully when i am being bullied as a working class women of color i have been bullied by this community and i think that it is too bad. because i actually have worked with very, and low income women of color and other people of color and who are not people of color but people from the lgbt community and other communities that have been exploited and who have been victims of

domestic violence. the women who have actually worked directly with the people who have suffered and been victims of domestic violence, i have. and so that being said, you know, i think that this pack was composed of white women and not the people who directly worked with people who have been victims have been able to exploit, - i think that is unfortunate that that has been allowed to take place, and so, and in my experience working with the domestic violence victims, i think that there are things

that are two things that are going on, one, is that many people who have been the victims of violence and bullying as i have been, actually, it takes a while before you start to recognize the patterns of violence that are kind of active in your life. so, i hope that this kind of education that will help people who are victims of violence, actually recognize that they are being exploited that they are in violent situations and it will give them the courage to kind of move out of those situation buzz but what i have found is people who are from the working class and are strained and unemployed, don't have the means to leave abusive situations.

president chu made sure that more money goes into this and it is long overdue and so if the experience of me, the experience of the level of discourse around the issue of domestic violence has increased this past year, and then, that is a good thing. you know? and i am glad that more money and more attention is being given to this. i hope that in the future we see more women of color associated with this issue, today i don't see any. there are not any here, aliana lopez had a different perspective she was never brought into the conversation as somebody who was part of the conversation should never have bought into the conversation. and so hopefully, that occurs, and i hope that in the future, that women like myself, who actually have shown or who have a lot of compassion, who have been who certainly are not in

support of domestic violence, perpetrators that this kind of bullying from the movement, does not continue to occur. and i think that it is really too bad that i have been sort of a scapegoated in this way. so, that being said, it is you know, again, i am glad that the issue of domestic violence is being highlighted in this city. i hope that more resources again, go into educating people maybe, even on on the in the school levels where you have a lot of young people, a lot of people in elementary school age who are being exposed to violence in their homes. and that they learn early too that that is not the type of behavior that they should be engaged in as they get older and as they grow up. because we know frequently that the people who are witnessing

this type of situation themselves they say, become perpetrators so i just hope that it leads to more education, in the schools. and it leads to more education from people who are being exposed to violence. and so that they understand how to extracate themselves from the domestic violence situations and that there are more resources given so that women and men who are in domestic violence situations where the means to extricate themselves because that is frequently not the case, the people from the working class and lower income don't have those means. and people who are not from that economic class, don't always have the self-awareness, or the education to know that they are being exposed and victimized or victims of a violent situation. but, again, i hope that this escalates to the issue of bullying. you know, which we are seeing

in a lot of you know, it is sort of like selective enforcement of bullying, it is okay for someone like me to be bullied and okay to go on in the housing authority with staff allegedly. it is okay for mayor staff to bully me, it is okay for some type of bullying to take place and other types of bullying if it is selective enforcement of bullying. so i hope that we cast a more fair eye on bullying and a fair enforcement of bullying that it is not selectively relegated to people that we have political agendas against and that we really take the political out of the conversation of bullying and that it really become more of a situation or a thing that is like really fairly applied when we cast a judge mental eye on this bullying. that is all that i have to say, i want to sign my name on this

as i was presented from doing so in the past and that is what i want to say. >> thank you, supervisor, olague and yes, i was actually very concerned here that you had wanted to sign on to this resolution in the past and were told that you were not welcome to do that. that is what i had heard as well. and i thought that that was actually, you know, very troubling because a lot of us come with very strong commitments against domestic violence and have a history of working against it and being counselors in the past as you have been as well. and that is very, very troubling. that we all share a common goal of making the city safe and her that is pretty much of purpose of this committee as well. and the election, that you just experienced was something that was really troubling for me as well. that there was a large amount of money at the end of the election was thrown in and used domestic violence as a tool and

a wedge to split you from would be supporters as well. and i thought that was troubling based especially because of your experience and history working in the field. so, i'm actually going to be putting my name on this as a co-sponsor for this resolution as well. and i look forward to working with domestic violence community in years to come to make the city a safer place. >> can i just say that i strongly stand behind my colleagues, supervisor olague and comments and sentiments and when a coalition group comes to my office to bring resolutions forward or ordinances i am in total solid tarty with the organizations that bring it to me. if they ask for certain people to be on the resolutions i abide by that with them. i disagreed with their request to pull you off of the resolution. and i am sorry for that. but i abide by my solidary that

brings them to me. but i will say that i totally gr with your comments about the need for a much better dialogue on race and class within the anti-domestic violence movement and how, political bullying and other efforts behind the scenes, we need to come together as different movements and i as allie am urging that as well but i feel terrible about what happened to you and i also support the domestic violence organization to have autonomy and when they bring issues to us and i am respectful of that that is why i abided by the request to pull you off now that it is before the committee i am proud that you and supervisor avalos are on as co-sponsors and the point that you made about youth organizations and we did also have the department of children youth and their families as a key part of this and that is an

effort that the young people are aware of the resources around them. this is one piece of raising awareness of the domestic violence in the workplace and also making sure that people know of all of the resources around them. and another piece of our efforts with the domestic violence and the commission on the status of women is also to strengthen the city's domestic violence by creating clearer department plans, a key point person in each of the departments, to identify the signs of domestic violence and to have action plans. and we are looking at other cities and how they have workplace domestic violence policies and there is a budget analyst report that we will be analyzing soon but i am proud to have you on as co-sponsors because i know of the great

work that both supervisor avalos and you. and what you have brought up especially on race and class differences in the movement and my goal is having a stronger movement but i always respect the autonomy of organizations that bring the resolutions and ordinances to us and i hope that you understand what i am saying about that. >> i believe that a lot of these organizations came to you with an outside political agenda. and i believe that if i hope that in the future, rather than bullying people and basically sort of marginalizing and the voices of two latino women, me and lopez to a large degree, that we were actually approached by the domestic violence community, and engaged in some kind of healthy dialogue around rather than

bullying and being marginalized by that very community that claims to be attempted to empower women in my case, women from the working class. and i think that they need to look at that too and look at how can in the future, we not ex-ploid person for their own... in some instances agendas that included pg&e monopoly on power issues and there were hit pieces on that that went out and it seems to me that there was a larger political agenda at play here. and i am sad that i was you know, i believe unfairly characterized and there was a lot of character assassination and a lot of what i would border on slander, i believe in these hit pieces that went out and i just think that it is sad that at the end of the day that

anybody in this community would have a more compassionate and less violent and bullying approach to engaging me and mis lopez in the conversation of domestic violence no one picked up the phone other than sending an e-mail claiming something that was untrue and baseless. and so again, i think that it is unfortunate that we were dealt with on a way that was bordering on bullying from the very community and i think that it is sad during the hearing that there were people that felt that they were in the community that they were not heard and i think that some something good comes out of it and more resource and more education going to the dv issue, and then we all win. >> so i just think that it could have been me and it could have taken me out of the picture it is not a personal thing, it is, you know, it is not about me. >> thank you, and i really appreciate your comments and i will just say that within the

commission on the status of women and the domestic violence that it has been many years that they have improved the workplace policies and i think as some stated in the public comments that this is the first step forward that i am very proud that both you and supervisor avalos are co-sponsors of this. >> okay, this item is before us, and could we have a motion to move it forward with recommendation? >> yes, and we will also provide the citations and i really appreciate the support and so moved. >> and we will take that without objection and madam clerk do we have any other items? >> there is no further business. >> we are ajournd. >> we are adjourned.

>> there has been an acknowledgement of the special places around san francisco bay. well, there is something sort of innate in human beings, i think, that tend to recognize a good spot when you see it, a spot that takes your breath away. this is one of them. >> an icon of the new deal. >> we stood here a week ago and we heard all of these dignitaries talk about the symbol that coit tower is for san francisco. it's interesting for those of us in the pioneer park project is trying to make the point that not only the tower, not only this man-built edifice here is a symbol of the city

but also the green space on which it sits and the hill to which is rests. to understand them, you have to understand the topography of san francisco. early days of the city, the city grows up in what is the financial district on the edge of chinatown. everything they rely on for existence is the golden gate. it's of massive importance to the people what comes in and out of san francisco bay. they can't see it where they are. they get the idea to build a giant wooden structure. the years that it was up here, it gave the name telegraph hill. it survived although the structure is long gone. come to the 1870's and the city has growed up remarkably. it's fueled with money from the nevada silver mines and the gold rush. it's trying to be the paris of the west. now the beach is the suburbs, the we will their people lived on the bottom and the poorest

people lived on the top because it was very hard getting to the top of telegraph hill. it was mostly lean-to sharks and bits of pieces of houses up here in the beginning. and a group of 20 businessmen decided that it would be better if the top of the hill remained for the public. so they put their money down and they bought four lots at the top of the hill and they gave them to the city. lily hitchcock coit died without leaving a specific use for her bequest. she left a third of her estate for the beautify indication of the city. arthur brown, noted architect in the city, wanted for a while to build a tower. he had become very interested in persian towers. it was the 1930's. it was all about machinery and sort of this amazing architecture, very powerful architecture. he convinced the rec park commission that building a tower in her memory would be the thing to do with her money.

>> it was going to be a wonderful observation place because it was one of the highest hills in the city anywhere and that that was the whole reason why it was built that high and had the elevator access immediately from the beginning as part of its features. >> my fear's studio was just down the street steps. we were in a very small apartment and that was our backyard. when they were preparing the site for the coit tower, there was always a lot of harping and griping about how awful progress was and why they would choose this beautiful pristine area to do them in was a big question. as soon as the coit tower was getting finished and someone put in the idea that it should be used for art, then, all of a

sudden, he was excited about the coit tower. it became almost like a daily destination for him to enjoy the atmosphere no matter what the politics, that wasn't the point. as long as they fit in and did their work and did their own creative expression, that was all that was required. they turned in their drawings. the drawings were accepted. if they snuck something in, well, there weren't going to be any stoolies around. they made such careful little diagrams of every possible little thing about it as though that was just so important and that they were just the big frog. and, actually, no one ever felt that way about them and they weren't considered something

like that. in later life when people would approach me and say, well, what did you know about it? we were with him almost every day and his children, we grew up together and we didn't think of him as a commie and also the same with the other. he was just a family man doing normal things. no one thought anything of what he was doing. some of them were much more highly trained. it shows, in my estimation, in the murals. this was one of the masterpieces. families at home was a lot more close to the life that i can remember that we lived. murals on the upper floors like the children playing on the swings and i think the little

deer in the forest where you could come and see them in the woods and the sports that were always available, i think it did express the best part of our lives. things that weren't costing money to do, you would go to a picnic on the beach or you would do something in the woods. my favorite of all is in the staircase. it's almost a miracle masterpiece how he could manage to not only fit everyone, of course, a lot of them i recognized from my childhood -- it's how he juxtaposed and managed to kind of climb up that stairway on either side very much like you are walking down a street. it was incredible to do that and to me, that is what depicted the life of the times in san francisco. i even like the ones that show the industrial areas, the once

with the workers showing them in the cannery and i can remember going in there and seeing these women with the caps, with the nets shuffling these cans through. my parents had a ranch in santa rosa and we went there all summer. i could see these people leaning over and checking. it looked exactly like the beautiful things about the ranch. i think he was pretty much in the never look back philosophy about the coit. i don't think he ever went to visit again after we moved from telegraph hill, which was only five or six years later. i don't think he ever had to see it when the initials are scratched into everything and people had literally destroyed the lower half of everything. >> well, in my view, the tower

had been pretty much neglected from the 1930's up until the 1980's. it wasn't until then that really enough people began to be alarmed about the condition of the murals, the tower was leaking. some of the murals suffered wear damage. we really began to organize getting funding through the arts commission and various other sources to restore the murals. they don't have that connection or thread or maintain that connection to your history and your past, what do you have? that's one of the major elements of what makes quality of life in san francisco so incredible. when people ask me, and they ask me all the time, how do you get to coit tower, i say you walk. that's the best way to experience the gradual elevation coming up above the

hustle and bustle of the city and finding this sort of oasis, if you will, at the top of the hill. when i walk through this park, i look at these brick walls and this lawn, i look at the railings around the murals. i look at the restoration and i think, yeah, i had something to do with that. learning the lessons, thank you, landmarks meet landmarks. the current situation at pioneer park and coit tower is really based in public and private partnership. it was the citizens who came together to buy the land to keep it from being developed. it was lily hitchcock coit to give money to the city to beautify the city she loved of the park project worked to develop this south side and still that's the basis of our future project to addres